When popular restaurant Roti closed its Harumi Triton Square branch in March, there were a lot of sad diners. Fortunately, a new and exciting restaurant and wine bar has opened to take its place… or perhaps we should say “dramatic,” since that is how Garden Bay describes itself. Garden Bay offers modern Italian cuisine in a casual style at reasonable prices. The dinner menu is quite extensive. For starters, you can pick from carpaccio, tomato and basil salad, pancetta, terrine, or bacon and egg salad, for ¥680 to ¥1,380. For entrees, Garden Bay offers lots of grilled meats, seafood, pasta, rice dishes and some vegetarian fare. No entree item costs more than ¥2,400, and there is an ample selection of red and white wines from Italy, Spain, France, Argentina and Australia to go with your dinner.
The restaurant is also popular with the lunchtime crowd.
Sets, which change daily, include pasta, a rice dish and a one-plate combination of salad, rice and meat. Of course, no meal is complete without dessert, and Garden Bay offers the likes of tiramisu, gateau chocolate cake and fruit tart. The restaurant is available for parties as well, starting at ¥2,400 per person for a two-hour period. Having just opened, Garden Bay doesn’t yet have an English menu, but the staff are friendly and floor manager Kanako Uehara is more than happy to help with any inquiries.

Simple japanese sauces can dress
up otherwise bland veggies for a healthy diet

Growing up I could never understand why my
friends did not like spinach. It was a staple in my house.
Almost always was there a stash of ohitashi in the refrigerator.
At anytime one could help oneself to the dark leafy greens
that had been quickly blanched and were marinating in a soy
sauce and sesame dressing. Funny how one assumes as a child
that everyone grows up eating the same dishes, only to realize
that is not the case. I remember being somewhat disappointed
(OK, disgusted) going to a friends house and being served
overly-steamed spinach with nothing more than salt.

The U.S. Agriculture Department has just come out with its
new dietary guidelines. It encourages eating four to five
servings of fruits and vegetables each day. Japan offers a
rich diversity of vegetables; if you can break from old habits
and consider having your vegetables in a wafu style, abiding
by the new guidelines may not be as hard to swallow.

Making the transition to cooking Japanese food does not have
to be difficult. Working a full-time job leaves little time
for cooking leisurely at home. The simplicity of Japanese
food is just that: simple. Consider sashimi: nothing more
than wasabi joyu (wasabi and soy sauce) and raw fish.

The following are easy to create, healthy and best of all,
delicious. If you are really in a bind, I would pick up some
of these that are pre-mixed and keep them on hand. I try and
keep a few jars of pre-mixed dressings in the refrigerator
at all times.

Ponzu sauce is one parts yuzu juice, soy sauce and dashi.
This refreshing sauce is great as a dipping sauce for shabu
shabu or simmered tofu. It also makes for a nice salad dressing.
Yudofu nabe is a healthy, vegetarian nabe, originating from
Kyoto. In your nabe, assemble kombu (which will provide the
dashi), bite size pieces of tofu, and vegetables as you like
such as napa cabbage, shungiku (chrysanthemum leaves), green
onions and carrots. Use the ponzu sauce as a dip for the tofu
and vegetables.

Caution: Goma miso, one part Saikyo miso
(the sweet, white miso from Kyoto) and one part nerigoma (creamy
sesame paste), may be the most addictive sauce. At this point,
it is still quite thick, so feel free to loosen it up with
some dashi. You may also adjust the flavor by adding sugar
or soy sauce. This tasty treat is also used as a dipping sauce
for shabu shabu. I like this with leafy dark greens which
have been blanched.

Umeboshi dressing is one part ume (the meaty part from umeboshi,
which you can purchase this in a tube), one part dashi and
a half-part sesame oil. This puckery dressing is lovely over
julienned daikon, and is quite addictive.

Another simple favorite is roasted sesame seeds ground in
a suribachi (mortar and pestle) and seasoned to taste with
sugar, soy sauce and some dashi. This dressed with blanched
green beans or broccoli makes eating vegetables fun. You can
use either white or black sesame seeds. To roast at home,
place the sesame seeds in a small, dry pan and gently roast
over low heat. The thin skinned sesame seeds will burn quickly,
so keep the pan moving. If you have extra sesame seeds leftover,
sprinkle over rice as furikake.

For you mustard fans, try mixing up some karashi mustard with
some soy sauce, dashi, and a bit of sugar to soften up the
heat. The heat of the karashi mustard warms up this dressing.

Who knew that eating vegetables could be this much fun? These
healthy dressings are not only easy to assemble, but they
are also a great way to boost the flavor of something that
can be bland, like spinach. Even if the only sauce Popeye
needed was Olive Oil, the rest of us need more.